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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23455156">Mortal</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/thefriendyouleftinthehallway/pseuds/thefriendyouleftinthehallway'>thefriendyouleftinthehallway</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>incomplete works on possibly-indefinite hiatus [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Limitless (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Angst, Emotions, Gen, Psychopathology &amp; Sociopathy</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-04-03</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-04-03</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-01 14:54:57</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,391</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23455156</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/thefriendyouleftinthehallway/pseuds/thefriendyouleftinthehallway</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>There is a drug that allows you to switch off physical pain and switch on synesthesia. So why wouldn’t it be able to give one the ability to switch off empathy? Short answer: who said it couldn't? As it turns out, there are things more addictive in this world than drugs. </p><p>(I know it doesn't line up perfectly with events within the episodes but let’s just call it AU and forget about it, shall we?)</p><p>KINDA EH &amp; UNFINISHED.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>incomplete works on possibly-indefinite hiatus [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1687315</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>10</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Chapter 1</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>(This note is on every fic in the series.) I have a lot of unfinished work that I may never get back to and it seemed like a bit of a waste so I thought I’d just post the better ones as-is.  That being said, I would like to state that while this piece of work is self-categorised as ‘unfinished’, that does not necessarily mean that I won’t ever return to them, so sadly the concepts are NOT up for grabs. (However, you can always post a work and put this in the ‘<a href="https://archiveofourown.org/help/parent-works-help.html">this work is a remix, a translation, a podfic, or was inspired by another work</a>’ section: I’d be really flattered and surprised.)</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p><p>
  <span>Brian tried it for the first time on purpose, but he didn’t mean anything by it. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It was a simple test of a theory. Given the fact he had been able to manually recreate the symptoms of synesthesia within his own brain, there must be other things he could do, too. And with an afternoon in the filing room alone, with nothing to do, the boredom alone drew him to questionable action against it. Retrospectively it had been a horrible idea. Perhaps. Maybe. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He’d spent a while researching it, looking at the ways that a psychopath or sociopath’s brain activity differs from that of what one might call a regular person, and looking into the dodgy psychologists that claim to be able to train regular people into sociopathic tendencies. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He read a particularly fascinating post on Reddit detailing the experiences of man who was offered by a psychologist to train him in sociopathy to improve his IQ score. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>By all accounts this seemed a feasible way to clear up a lot of processing power, or so said the version of himself in the corner of the room, leaning up against the wall in leather and sunglasses. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Even on NZT, he may or may not have failed to consider the reasons why this might not be the best course of action. Closing his eyes, he began a search for what he called ‘the psychopath switch’. In all honesty, he wasn’t really sure why he did it. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Closing his eyes and diving into the abstract mess of his mind, he flicked the switch. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>When his eyes opened, he was not disappointed to note that the world seemed to have lost a bit of the magic it seemed to gain when he was on NZT. It didn’t really bother him. He wasn’t explicitly unbothered, just vaguely nonchalant. It felt almost as if a weight had been lifted from his shoulders, dirty glasses being cleaned for the first time in months; a path finally clearing. He would describe it as extremely freeing, but that was too emotive a phrase to truly capture what this was. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Day-to-day he experienced so much emotional stress that it was always there, ignored, but like a pressure building in the back of his skull. And once that preassure was relieved, it felt so much better. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It was then that he was asked to lie to that boy. The one whose brother was a terrorist. He sat there and did it. And it was incredibly easy. The fake smile and the opposite of the truth. It was really rather satisfying, to see his lies working, to observe the shift in the boy’s demeanour from dubious to worried to trusting.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He really had no reason </span>
  <em>
    <span>not</span>
  </em>
  <span> to lie to the boy. After all, he could do nothing but gain from it. The FBI had asked him to complete this task, meaning that doing so would put him in their favour, possibly helping him in many potential ways in the future. Having them trust in him more could be useful for his own benefit directly, or through a greater level of ease in assisting someone like Morra. The immunity shots were important. Vital even. And therefore, doing what the FBI told him to, unless it went against Morra’s requests, was a necessity. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>And this was fun. It was like some kind of puzzle. Say something wrong, go back and amend, until it was perfect. Until he knew exactly how to do it, until he had it down to a tee, lying to this boy was like breathing. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Oh, and there was a bomb. Maybe it wouldn’t be very convenient if part of New York was wiped off the map. So he was doing it for that, too. Almost forgot about that. Well, it wasn't like he was the one living there. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>The kid was going to meet up with his brother tomorrow, and they were going to capture a terrorist, or someone planning an act of terrorism. It  had slipped Brian’s mind. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>When he came down that evening he felt the switch flick back. It was like suddenly realising your exhaustion or your pain after a brief moment of distraction. Like he’d been allowed to remove some kind of weighted vest for the first time in his life, and now he was putting it back on. He felt heavy again. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>And he felt the slightest twinge of what could only be guilt eating away at his chest, his heart. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>What he would give not to feel that. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>***</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>The second time it happened, it was an accident. He wasn't even trying. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>In fact, it was the very day after the first time. The Garter boy was going to see his brother. He used some choice words that let his brother know the game was up, and it ended badly. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>When the camera feed went dead and Brian hurtled out of the van and around the corner to where they were, what he found was the boy bleeding on the ground, he’d been shot. Brian had spent some time building an unlikely bond with that boy, and now he was dying in front of his eyes. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Without even trying, without making any attempt at it whatsoever, the switch just… flicked. And then this whole situation was nothing more than… distasteful. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Switch or not there was some level of shock involved. And through a haze of mild disgust and something bordering fascination, Brian looked down at the boy, expressionless as he watched him die. He didn’t actually see him die, that happened in the ambulance. But on NZT, something in the back of his mind that wasn’t completely drowned out by his focus on the boy ran the calculations—he saw the moment the boy became unsaveable. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>And he felt next to nothing about it. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>When he came down off NZT, it took awhile for the switch to flick back. And when it did, a part of him wished it hadn’t. A part of him also wished it had never flicked on in the first place. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>The onslaught of pure horror had the emotional impact of the day’s events all catching up to him at once. He had stood there and watched, doing nothing but make quiet calculations about when exactly that Garter boy had passed the point of saving. He stood there and watched that happen, and he didn't do a thing to help, he didn't even want to. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Someone had died. A young, innocent human being had been killed because he was involving himself in something Brian had convinced him to do, and enjoyed convincing him. With lies. Lies that had, if you followed a somewhat dubious train of logic, gotten that kid killed. Dead. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It was so bizarre. In the last little while, he’d probably felt, not for the first time but with the most frequency in his life, the fear of people dying. Before his dad got sick he’d not felt it before, and after his dad got sick he felt it nearly every day in the beginning. And then he got… used to it. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Now it was all coming back. The truth that everyone he knew could simply die at any moment. But now his concern was no longer that he wouldn't be able to help them. His concern was that he simply wouldn't care? What did that even feel like? Sure, he’d experienced it earlier today, but now it was gone. And without NZT, he couldn't remember what it really felt like. It was like a high-tech artificial limb, being able to sense the pressure, but not really feeling something. He knew but he didn't know. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Brian kept wondering why he was working for the FBI anyway. Why didn’t they just fire him? After all, had he not just gotten someone killed? No, he kept reminding himself it wasn't his fault. It wasn't. He took a bath to think about it, but all that succeeded in was making him uncomfortable as he fell asleep and woke up at 2 am in cold and slimy-feeling water which he had to pull himself out of, shivering and feeling sorry for himself. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>His father always told him it would do no good to feel sorry for himself. But he couldn't help it. He was feeling guilt, sadness that someone had died and he was feeling it, as much as he didn't want to admit, for himself. He was upset that he had been hurt by something, and so, shamefully, he allowed himself no more than thirty seconds to cry. But forcing himself to stop crying after he’d just begun left him feeling cold and distinctly unsatisfied. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Now dry, cold, upset and tired, he fell into bed at passed out almost instantly, only to wake up three hours later from a disturbingly real-feeling dream that seemed to blend into the reality around him, but turn everything familiar into an uncomfortably abstract, geometrically impossible prison, and everyone was dead, dying or betraying him. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Waking up from that, he clenched his jaw and tried with difficulty to ignore the growing feeling that he needed to cry. Instead, he threw the covers off of himself and marched frustratedly over to the main portion of the safehouse apartment. Trying to think of something to do, his mind was clouded by feeling. Acknowledging and accepting he’d be regretting this later, he began to walk around, knocking everything off every surface and onto the ground, ignoring whether it was breakable or not. He did it in deadpan. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Once this was complete he began to open cupboards, drawers, shelves and tip their contents onto the floor, allowing things to break and smash. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>This wasn't about the Garter boy and he knew that. This wasn't about some kid he’d only known a few days. It was about the switch. Did he love or hate it? He hated that when he flicked the switch, he didn't care. He hated that he was happy to let anything happen to anyone else when he flicked the switch. He needed it though. He craved being able to just not care. Caring was exhausting, painful, an ever-constant weight on his mind. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He was in conflict with himself. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Lying on the floor in his trashed apartment, he felt vaguely bad for the concern he subjected Mike and Ike to when they walked in and thought at first he had been attacked. He didn't confirm or deny anything they asked him, simply saying he was fine. He was fine. He was FINE. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>When they gave him his pill for the day, he took it desperately and perhaps a little too quickly, resulting in a glance shared between Mike and Ike that he spotted just barely. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>As soon as the drug kicked in, he flicked the switch. And then everything was fine. </span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Chapter 2</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>short because it's not finished. :/</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Brian was bored. He got bored quicker when the switch was flicked. </p><p>He wondered why people didn’t notice when he had the switch flicked. It felt so different. Then again, the way he acted was strategic, and he was a damn good liar in this state at least. What surprised him most was Rebecca. She was usually quite an attentive and observant person. Very perceptive. Why hadn’t she noticed? Perhaps he was just that good. </p><p>He also wondered exactly why Sands hadn’t figured it out yet. Perhaps it was the fact that he wasn't actually on the drug when he was him last, and Still he’d been working on ways to get the switch to last through his time between doses. He’d found that with his ordinary brain he could only hold it for about an hour before things snapped back into place. And een then, it was less incredible, being off NZT with the switch flipped. </p><p>But when he didn’t have the switch flipped, he felt horrible. He felt like this world wasn’t a fair enough place to consider living in. But it was all because of the switch. Yet he couldn’t give it up. He didn’t have the sheer willpower to do something like that. To subject himself to that kind of suffering when it wasn’t necessary, even if what was keeping him from it was also what had caused it. </p><p>He had no problems with setting Rebecca up with those documents, though he found he hadn’t counted on Naz being just human enough to let it slip. He did tell Sands he’d tried that option, and told him knowing that such a man would do with that information what he would, be that absolutely nothing, or an assassination. And of course when he came down he attacked one of his walls. His knuckles were split and bloody, but when he was back on the drug, then he could switch that pain off. The emotional and the physical. </p><p>Sometimes he didn’t flick the switch. When he was kidnapped, he didn’t flick the switch. Not until later. When the first of his kidnappers got shot, the switch flicked involuntarily. When they assumed he was about to run, they tried to grab him. But though these mean were trained professionally, They didn’t have the benefit of the drug. And they had a haze of emotions through their thoughts that Brian was not subject to. </p><p>They captured him in the end, but one of them lost an eye in the process. Brian would note that it was not a very pleasant feeling, to have one’s fingers in someone else’s eye socket. And now that his hands were tied behind his back he was having difficulty wiping the blood off. </p><p>He allowed an expression of disgust to cover his face. </p><p>In the end, manipulating the Hollinger guy into shooting his partner was not all that difficult. These people were so gullible, unlike him. </p><p>He saw the Russian coming, he let the man get his throat cut. He forced himself to throw up in response, pretending to be bothered. The guy didn’t really want to kill him, he just wanted the pill. The poisoned pill.</p><p>Brian gave it to him, feigning fear, but didn’t warn him of the poison. He only had a little while of NZT left in his system, and he used it to shoot the man, who was disoriented from the poison, in the head. Just in case. </p><p>His NZT wore off almost immediately after he’d done it.</p>
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